


My Virtues Uncounted

by little_ogre



Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: Getting Together, M/M, Masturbation, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, cliches, enough pining to support a lumber industry, horny on main, xena levels of historic accuracy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-10
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2020-06-26 01:50:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19758142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/little_ogre/pseuds/little_ogre
Summary: Billy likes routines, likes their calm and clarity. Cleaning knives in the evenings and rolling cigarettes in the mornings. He can, and does, roll them as they go along but it’s nice to have a ready stack, too much trouble to fiddle with them in the wind, or on horseback, or with Goody’s panic rising beside him, and its soothing to set out his cigarette case, papers, tobacco and the separate pouch with madak. Its meditative and he has much to think on. He has one problem and ten cigarettes to solve it.The problem is Goodnight. Or rather, his own insidious and traitorous feelings for Goodnight.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I changed the name, for some reason it was really bothering me.

It’s early in the morning, the hotel saloon abandoned and empty, Billy has taken a chair down and settled down at a table, back to the wall and eyes to the door. 

Goodnight is still sleeping in their room, he’d slept easily through the night and Billy is not worried about leaving him (he’s annoyed with himself for thinking he should be worried, _might_ be worried,Goody is not his responsibility, and isn't this the very problem). 

Billy likes routines, likes their calm and clarity. Cleaning knives in the evenings and rolling cigarettes in the mornings. He can, and does, roll them as they go along but it’s nice to have a ready stack, too much trouble to fiddle with them in the wind, or on horseback, or with Goody’s panic rising beside him, and its soothing to set out his cigarette case, papers, tobacco and the separate pouch with _madak_. Its meditative and he has much to think on. He has one problem and ten cigarettes to solve it.

He starts rolling the first cigarette. Easy and smooth. 

The problem is Goodnight. Or rather, his own insidious and traitorous feelings for Goodnight. Billy had always had an effective approach to life, never worrying about sentiment too much, it was easy, lay out the problem, find the most effective solution and execute it (most times literally). It had come to him when he realised that the most effective solution to his problems (cold, starving, exhausted) was simply to kill his master and run away. It would give him other troubles but at least he wouldn't be solving them while starving and cold. And once a solution was established everything else only becomes a series of steps (find a knife, sharpen it, wait). 

But for this there is no solution. He starts on the second cigarette, flattens the paper, spreading the tobacco, slowly, methodically. 

When they met Billy was reluctantly going along with Goodnight’s suggestion, equal shares in their profits and Goodnight softening the blow of prejudice, if only to buy himself a little time before he shook the man off for good. It was an unusual offer, different from anything he has been offered before, and initially he was cautious. But they fit together surprisingly well and after only a short while Billy knew he liked Goodnight, liked the first strains of a friendship that they were building.

And if that had been all it would’ve been all right, having a friend was a fine thing. On the trail the presence of another person could sometimes make the difference between life or death, having a trusted friend and a comrade was only practical. If he’d only been able to keep their friendship impersonal, he would’ve had no cause for reproach, but no.

When they made camp the first day together Billy had been sore and brutalised from the bar fight and desperate not to show it, bruises on his face smarting and his shoulders and back so stiff he could hardly move and with this strange white man he didn’t know if he could trust. And they settled down and ate their dinner, such as it was, Robicheaux looking like a man who was relying on liquid sustenance too heavily for being much bothered with provisions, and after a little while Robichaux got up and hauled some water from the creek, setting it to boil over the fire. He put the hot water and a pile of rags and a tin next to Billy’s feet.

“I’ll just go see to the horses,” he said, jerking his head, before he took of in the gathering dusk, whistling softly to himself. Billy kept a watchful eye out for him the whole time he cleaned up, putting hot soaked rags across his shoulders to relieve the aches and pressing the cloth against his swollen eye. And all the while Robichaux kept up a steady stream of low noise, whistling and humming softly and talking to the horses as he checked their feet and made sure they were securely picketed with plenty of grazing, easily letting Billy keep track of him in the darkness, his voice always just comfortably far away. 

It was kindness, surprisingly delicate and graceful, giving him the space and privacy to be vulnerable and it sat uneasily and unfamiliar with Billy. The tin contained liniment, smelling sharply of camphor and mint and he rubbed it into the bruises and cuts, viciously, shaplessly angry at something, pressing it into the raised areas, hissing at the sting.

“You smell fresh as a peppermint humbug,” Robichaux told him cheerfully when he returned to the fire, a considerate time after Billy has buttoned up his shirt, as if his absence was completely coincidental. Billy himself said nothing but tossed the tin and the man fumbled the catch and swore goodnaturedly. He resented it the day after when he moved easier, more smoothly, hating having to owe anything like gratitude to anyone.

Life has made Billy into a cynic, he has seen what turned the levers of society; and of greed and cruelty he had seen plenty, but of any tangible evidence of love he’d never seen a speck, and now he was at a loss as to what else to call this.Whatever stirred in his chest and guts everytime Goody turned to him with a smile, blue eyes sparkling. Had it been simply a matter of lust, or physical want, he might have dared to broach the subject, a practical solution, after all, to a problem they must both experience, but this was a rope of emotion twinned so fine out or respect, care, loyalty, concern and desire that there was no other name for it. He must reluctantly accept himself in love, or at least _infatuated_. One second too happy and the next miserable, torn between the conviction that it was precious and must be protected, that Goodnight might return a fraction of his emotions, must also want to press close and kiss and love unrestrained, and then the equally strong opposite conviction that it was a liability to be shed as fast as possible, that his feelings for Goodnight could only be used to hurt him; and Goodnight himself should be the last person to know. 

Goody is drunk often, but Goody drunk and in a good mood is an unusual occurrence. It happens more often these days, and Billy shouldn’t take pride in it but he does. When Goody is slightly drunk and happy he can be enticed to call Billy “ _chér”_ , a soft sound which he isn’t quite sure what it means, only that he likes it and that it happens in unguarded moments where more of Goody’s Cajun French slips out. It is possible that Billy is a little drunk too, his arm on the table with the shirt sleeve rolled up, pressing into Goody’s arm, linking them skin to skin. He has a shallow cut on the arm, literally just a scratch, but everytime Goody shifts the cut stings and burns, it feels good and makes him want to press closer, find more of the sensation of Goody’s skin against his own.

Billy rarely drinks too much but there was something about the tempting stretch of Goody’s throat that made him drain his glass more than he should and when they were stumbling back to the hotel the world is well and truly spinning. The only thing solid seems to be Goody, Billy has his arm thrown around his shoulder, hand fisted in the rough fabric of his coat. The coarse material feels comforting, warm and real.

“Billy, you’re clinging like moss to stone,” Goody tells him, patting his hand, he has his own arm around Billy’s waist as they walk unsteadily, like two newborn colts.

“It’s spinning,” Billy answers, laughing for no reason, allowing himself to bury his face in Goody's shoulder and breathe him in. 

It was a long time ago since he had friends, had ties of loyalty, of emotion to another person where their well-being ceased to be a matter of practicality and instead took on - took on something else. Wanting their well-being for their own sake. Wanting Goody to sleep well not because it might affect his performance the next day, but for how it eased the lines on his face and his sloped shoulders. Because when something eased in Goody, Billy was content as well. He feels a strange possessiveness for Goody, for Goody’s body. When they met he was nothing but a skinny streak with a bushy beard, twitchy and smelling of whiskey, his tongue white and eyes yellow, and now he's put on weight and moves with a confident swagger, one hand on the gun at his hip. The whites of his eyes are clearer and occasionally there is a lopsided smile too, not the nervous grimace, but a real smile. Every time their eyes meet Billy feels something twist in his chest, has to fight his own desire to reach out, not only out of physical lust but to simply show affection, to caress and pet. Squeeze his shoulder or run a thumb over Goody’s knuckles, taste that grin with his tongue. He is mostly successful but it's getting harder each time, until he knows he won't be able to suppress it. 

He looks at the neat line of cigarettes, each tidily rolled and set just so and he knows that a decision has been made. This has to end, it’s too dangerous, he’s setting out on his own tomorrow. He’s leaving Goodnight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The description of what Goody was like when they met is inspired by a line in Hunt for the Wilderpeople: When we met you were a bum smelling of methylated spirits.  
> An apt description if any.
> 
> The original title, "Let my heart forget to beat" comes from the band Shovels & Rope's song Birmingham, about love and longing and is a riff on the Hymn Rock of ages. The full chorus goes "Rock of ages, cleft for me, let my heart forget a beat, why do you demand?" but for some reason it really bothered me, hence the change.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Features Billy being Very Horny, on a mountain.

The sky sits low and looks like rain when Billy adjust the final cinch on the saddle and prepares to sit up. It’s strange, only his horse on the hitching post outside the hotel, not the usual routine of the two of them getting ready together, sharing glances and bumping shoulders. Just Billy, with a heart heavier than lead. 

He’s in the saddle when Goody comes through the doors, his waistcoat unbuttoned and carrying a bundle.

“Billy!” he says and Billy feels his heart contract and twinge painfully, he has to get out of here.“This is yours,” Goody says, reaching the bundle out and handing it to him. 

Its their oilskin tarpaulin, the one they string up against the weather when it rains. It’s almost certainly not Billy’s. The whole miserable previous afternoon he had sorted out which blackened pots and pans were his, which blanket was his and he’s pretty certain that tarp was something Goody already had when they met but he still takes it, for the chance that their fingers might brush. They don’t, but Goody stays on the porch after, anxiously twitching.

“We never settled the accounts,” he says, looking up at Billy, his arm finding one of the posts to lean against.

“The accounts?”

“We’ve some money shared, I’ve been putting away.”

This is true, Billy can’t really believe that this is how bad it’s gotten, that he’s forgotten about actual hard earned cash, in favor of just getting away. And he knows there is nothing to do about it now, they can’t wire for the money from here. Place’s barely big enough for a post station.

“Could be,” Goody starts and clears his throat, “Could be, we could meet up in a while and settle up?” His eyes dart to Billy and away again. “Say, six months from now, in uh, Carson City?”

Billy is honestly about to just shake his head, cut his losses and ride away, but it feels like he’s been drowning and then offered one final breath of air, sweet and irresistible and finds himself nodding instead. He can’t bear not seeing Goodnight again, and he feels a tiny unasked ray of hope crack through him, maybe this doesn’t have to end, _maybe_ all he needs is time to get his head straight. If they meet up in six months, he might have gotten over his infatuation and they can be partners again, and ride together without Billy’s heart, which really should be nonexistent by now, making itself known. So he nods.

“Sounds fair, that would be September, right?”

“Yeah,” Goody says, a smile on his face Billy won’t think of as relieved or dazzling, “First of September, there’s a hotel, Ormsby house, anyone can tell you where it is, meet outside, on the first?”

Billy nods again. “See you then,” he says, flicks his hat and sets his heels to his horse before he does anything stupid, like getting off his horse and pledging his undying love right there in the mud. He absolutely does not look back.

He does not miss Goody. 

He doesn’t miss Goody at all, he is just out of sorts and spoiling for a fight, and the weather is bad and the food tastes off and there are rocks in his bedroll. 

He gets into fights and gets beaten up and goes to Chinatown in the nearest town large enough to have one, and drinks tea and get decent food again and it’s a relief not having to explain to somebody all the time, not be a strange face, as long as he stays within that narrow framework. He could braid his hair and get a quilted jacket and no white person would ever know the difference, sell opium or do laundry and finally fit into the tiny space this country has made for him. But no, he is Billy Rocks now and if there is no space for him he’ll carve his own. He finds some of his old contacts and takes on some of his darker assignments, wins some quick draws, gets into fights, drinks too much and he doesn’t miss Goody.

It’s not until he’s left the town behind, alone out on the trail it comes to him. He’s half asleep on a mountain, rolled in blankets in his little tent, warm and comfortable. He’s dozing, and his mind unbidden turns to Goodnight, lingering on his smile, his strong hands, how he looked shirtless in the early mornings, washing as they broke camp, water running down his arms and sternum in the golden light and he’s touches himself before he’s even aware of it, and thinks about nothing but Goody, about what might have happened if he’d reached out, and comes like a train at the vivid image of Goody’s pretty mouth wrapped around his cock.

He has guarded his thoughts so carefully and never, never thought about this, and now it's like the floodgates have opened and he can’t stop; he teases himself back into hardness again and again, does it until he's lazy and sore with it. Imagining every way he could have had Goody, on his back, his hands and knees, with his hand, with his mouth, front and back, spilling over his thighs or taut stomach. Goody’s seed splashing hot and thick in his mouth or over his chest, or in his ass, acts of lewdness and depravity previously not familiar to him, that he had never even thought of or thought he wanted before. Goody crying and gasping for him, soft whimpers and choked back moans and outright hitching cries. How it would feel to come, buried deeply in his body, teeth latched into his strong shoulder. It’s like discovering a new need, as acute as hunger or thirst. And Billy misses him so much, he can't believe the feeling - can’t believe himself capable of feeling this much, this deeply- it claws in his chest like a physical wound. It is unacceptable. Having given his thoughts free rein he finds he can no longer exercise his usual control over them, thoughts of Goody are always with him and its intolerable. Billy tells himself that it’s only simple lust, he’s been chaste for too long, it’s nothing to do with Goodnight really. It will pass, it _has_ to pass.

He remembered another mountain side when the early snow had capped the peaks and they had somehow managed to cram everything inside of their tiny little tent.

“Everything but the horses,” Goody had said with a snicker and they made a cocoon for themselves of their shared blankets and slept back to back. When Billy woke Goody was already up and had the fire going and coffee besides, and Billy had found himself smiling without any sort of conscious effort, just feeling the happiness of companionship and the clear air, how fine it was to have someone to share it all with. How pleasing the curve of Goody's neck was, the blue of his eyes and his crooked teeth. And deep in his chest, his heart made a confused little double flip, with a happy, unfamiliar emotion. 

In the next town town he finds somebody just to get it the hell out of his system, like driving a fever. He lets himself be held down and fucked by a man who looks nothing like Goody, sounds nothing like Goody and the two of them rut in the dark against the rough planking of a building. Afterwards he lets himself lean back against the man’s shoulder, savouring his strength for the space of a breath, two breaths, before breaking away, going their separate ways.

The pleasure burns through him for days. He didn't kiss him but the man bit and lipped into his hairline and Billy wears the bruises proudly, like a shield, half hidden and smarting. He’s alone in his body again, Goody’s ghost exorcised and he rides on his own on the trails, the horses hooves thudding against the soft ground.

Billy turns his horse towards Carson City where they are supposed to rendezvous, tries very hard to pretend his heart isn’t pulling him along every mile, or that he’s slightly early but unable to stay away, just in case Goody is early too. 

Maybe, he thinks, just maybe he will get into a fight just for the pleasure of getting his blood good and hot and Goody’s careful fingers on his face afterwards, his obvious concern which is like a balm to Billy’s soul, and his equally obvious admiration which he thrives on. He’s always impatient with the fussing and doctoring, of Goody’s downturned frown and messing about with salve and iodine but a secret part of him craves it, drinks it in like a flower drinks water. It would be worth a black eye for Goody’s exclamation of worry and gently tilting his head this way and that, thumbs stroking the edges of the bruise. And if his imagination takes him to a place where Goodnight carefully maps the edges of the black eye with a soft whisper of fingers before pushing the rough pad of his thumb into the smarting bruise and catching his mouth in a kiss, climbing hot and demanding into his lap, alternating the pleasure and pain in pulsating waves, well he can hardly be blamed can he?

He is on a reasonably trafficked stretch of road, a week from Eagle Valley when he sees a wagon, run off the road and rolled down the steep bank, tipped on its side. Billy turns his horse down the bank, coming round the side of the wagon to see if there is anyone who might need help, and lo and behold: there is Goodnight, surveying the wagon. 

Its really him, his slight, curved figure, the hat pushed back, scratching his hair and one hand on his cocked hip. Billy supposes there are stranger coincidences but he’ll be damned if he can think of any.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who left a kudos or comment, they are everything.
> 
> I'm actually writing this as I go so I'm not sure when it will update next. But hopefully this one is a good filler.


	3. Chapter 3

The little girl, Luó Xiaolian, is sitting on the top of the bank looking down at them with her head supported in her hands. She has her jacket neatly tucked around her and the long winding end of her braid brushing the ground. Billy is not good at guessing ages of children but he’d say she's about nine. When Billy left Goodnight five and a half months ago he had not expected to find him again as the escort to a Chinese woman and girl. 

“So..” Goody says as they slide around in the mud trying to stabilize the wagon before getting started on trying to get it back on the road. They had sacrificed the back rail of the to make a stable point under it and Billy cut a few young trees to use as levers getting back upright. Its stiff work and Goody and Billy are both sweaty and smeared with mud.

The woman is working on unloading as much of the weight as possible before they try to right the wagon. If she was surprised at meeting Billy she didn’t show it, only nodded her head briefly at Goody’s introduction. Her hair has grey streaks in it but she moves with the grace of a dancer. Her name is Wáng Qiuyue and Billy figured one name deserved another.

“This is Bi-” Goodnight started but Billy had cut him off.

“Nahm Jung-soo,” he said decisively and Goody’s jaw dropped.

“Really? Jun souh?”

“Not to you,” Billy said with a scowl, pointing his finger at Goody. “ _You_ still say Billy Rocks.” Goody nodded as eagerly as if his head had been on a string.

Goody tried to explain the situation as they labour under the cart and Billy couldn’t help the smile on his face. Goody has a muddy streak over his forehead and his hair is longer than Billy ever’s seen it. Billy is uncomfortably aware of stroking himself to completion the previous night to the thought of eating Goody’s ass like a ripe persimmon, and coming so hard it painted streaks on the sloping tent wall. It should be more difficult than it is to meet his eyes. 

“So after we had split up, where was that? In any case, I was a bit of a loose end and didn’t rightly plan where I was going, ended up drifting back towards Texas, which is an unholy long way as well you know and I’m not rightly sure where I would have ended up maybe all the way to Mexico…”

Goody’s story rambles this way and that and Billy can hear the thing he is treading around, nimbly side-stepping with strange southern idioms and hyperbole: Things were not so good for me without you. 

“Anyhow I met these two beautiful ladies,” -this made Miss Wáng snort dryly- “while they were trying to get on the post-chase to Carson City and being denied a place, in spite of having a ticket and that lovely little girl being an Imperial Princess, if you ever heard such a thing…”

“Goody, there is no way she is-” Billy starts but Miss Wáng cut him off

“He made that up. We’re actors. On tour out of San Francisco, the Jade Dragon troupe. Miss Xiaolian gets ill, and had to stay behind. Her parents are the directors so I stay with her.” 

Billy nods, he finds that he likes her. She seems to tolerate, rather than be taken in by, Goody’s bullshit and that puts her on Billy’s good side.

“And now I'm their escort back to Carson City where they’ll reunite with the rest of the company,”

“Out of the goodness of your heart?” Billy asks, raising his eyebrows. 

“For a small fee,” Goody answers, smooth as Tennessee whiskey, not at all ashamed and Billy can see how it would have gone. A woman and child left behind with only the fairly straightforward task of travelling with the mail coach wouldn't need an escort, but denied places their situation would suddenly be different, tasked with travelling the miles on their own. 

And Goodnight, unsteady on his feet, sweeping in, with his charm and reputation onto the scene. 

“I'm surprised you just didn't get them on the coach,” he says and Miss Wáng shakes her head with a look of deep disdain on her face. 

“And get thrown off the next stop? It was better for us to make our own way. He said he had a friend that he helped in the same way, must have been you.”

“In any case,” Goody continues, “when we got turned away from the third place, and I never had such trouble with you - least not before you killed anyone - I thought an Imperial Princess and her nurse sounded so much better than travelling actors, and anyway, here we are. Little girl’s a natural, you'd have thought she'd been carried around in a palanquin her whole life.” 

Billy can’t help his smile, Goodnight seemed to have an innate need for drama and small scale deceptions, all the evenings where he had made up fantastical stories about Billy's past in saloons to astonished listeners (Billy's favourite had been one where he had cut off his hair and braided it into a rope to lash three dragons together and fly them over the Rocky Mountains. Goody had concluded that story with saying that anyone could see that Billy's hair was quite short, compared to how long it _had_ been, and therefore the story must be quite true).Goody had always been something of a con artist. 

He knew both of them were trying to downplay their reunion, but when they spotted each other down in the muddy ditch Goody was in his arms before he even had time to think about it, and it was like a punch to the stomach. He’d never wanted to let go, and whatever other man has existed on him, summoned by their furtive encounter in the dark, was burnt away in the blink of an eye. All his body can remember is Goody, Goody, _Goody_. He had been warm and solid in Billy’s arms, sharp shoulders and rangy legs, a perfect fit.

Everything he had told himself fell away like a house of cards. It wasn't over, it had only gotten worse. And now he had the mental images to accompany him. Now he knew he'd like to split Goodnight open and plunge into him, given even half a chance. He doesn't know how to make himself walk away a second time, when his body and mind, his very soul, hungers for him.

They had made no plans save meeting up and settling their accounts, Goodnight might leave, continue on his drifting way until he's nothing but a speck in the distance and an ache in Billy's heart. There were already so many bleached bones in the desert, how would Billy ever know if there were a few more, even so beloved to him?

These are depressing thoughts to have labouring in the gathering dark under a cart so he tries to push them away, contenting himself with letting his eyes feast upon Goodnight, his strong legs and arms, the fine sheet of sweat at his collarbones where the top button of his shirt was undone and cravat discarded. If this is the last time he sees him by God he will have something to remember him by.

*

Eventually the wagon creaks out of the ditch like a slow beetle, laboriously climbing uphill. The dark is coming on when they are on the road again, and the horses are breathing like bellows and Billy and Goodnight covered in mud. Rather than risking trying to travel further they make camp by the roadside.

Miss Wáng and Xiaolian made their beds inside the wagon, the warm glow of the lamp painting their shadows softly on the canvas. Billy can hear them speak, the rise and fall of the tones familiar even if he can't understand the accent. When his father left Joseon for China he took Billy with him and he spent his youth running wild in Canton, learning how to steal and fight with knives. His Cantonese is good enough but other Chinese accents were foreign to him. 

Miss Xiaolian, the little princess, had jumped on Goodnight's suggestion that Billy should be her retainer and loyal family servant. Billy thought it was a ridiculous idea, it was clear that they were not even remotely from the same area, but she insisted and it's not like anyone can tell the difference anyway. Between them they speak enough English and Cantonese to make a rough, quick patter and Billy admits that he wants to humour her with her flashing eyes and intensive face. She is so very serious about acting. 

“You can't be our loyal retainer looking like that. Your hair is scandalous,” she says, popping her face out through the canvas and glaring at Billy and then disappearing again.

He’s not really had a plan for it. Ever since he started riding with Goodnight Billy has mostly been letting his hair grow until it was long enough to bunch under his hat and keep out of his eyes. It was still short at the front and back, but long enough at the crown now that he can gather it into a knot at the top of his head. It's nice enough, it reminds him a little of his father, and when he wears his hat it looks just like a short western style, and it's different from the close cropped picture on his wanted poster. Right now though it was full of grease and mud, the last bathhouse was at least two week away. 

He looks over at Goody, who shrugs. “I’m not saying she’s right,” he says, and then looks Billy over considering. “Not saying she is wrong either, mind you. There’s a little crick just over there, might go and avail myself of it before she turns her attention on me.”

Goody walks away, rifle over his shoulder to hunt and wash in the growing dusk when a pale little hand sticks out through the canvas opening and beckoned to Billy.

“Get in here,” Xiaolian says. “We wash, and we wash you too.”

He is more or less manhandled into the wagon by her, sharp elbows and sharp pointed chin, and they wash his hair more or less against his protestations, his shirt gone heedless of what he was saying. It's not that Billy is modest or shy but there is something about their way of mercilessly stripping him that makes him cross his arms over his chest and hunch over. He’s never had sisters or aunties to do this to him and he feels unaccountably unprepared for their ruthlessness.

Xiaolian fuss over him, and it is clear that Qiuyue humours her, helping to wash his hair, not with harsh carbolic soap but the soft foam of hibiscus root, a smell straight from his childhood -his mother washing her hair with the fragrant liquid - and comb it, until it runs off the comb like water. They found a handsome silk jacket for him in a coffer of costumes. It was blue and quilted, and if turned inside out it transformed into a red guards jacket. He put his foot down when Miss Lao wanted to put hairpin ornaments into his hair, big red flowers with white sprays, but he relented when she found a silver pin about as long as his palm. It could go under his hat when he rides and look suitably exotic when it's off, and it matches his knives. He thinks he might even be able to sharpen it to a point and use it as a bodkin. It feels strange to be in this finery, the collar of the jacket keeps scratching against his jaw and his callouses catch on the silk when he brushes his hand over the jacket. Still it did feel good to be clean. 

Goody returns from his little expedition with two jackrabbits and wet hair, scrubbing at his ears and complaining about the chill and the ungodly cleanliness of women all the way. He's still buttoning up his shirt when he froze across the fire staring at Billy, mouth hanging open. 

Billy twitches his chin at him in a silent question and Goodnight honest to god stumbles over his own feet and turns beet red. 

“It's just… you look..” he mutters and a bizarre hope grips Billy. Goody continues to stare at the ground a long while before rallying and he kept looking at Billy and looking away quickly again, a red stain all over his face. 

It makes Billy think maybe, _maybe_ and he knew he shouldn't, but still can’t help it and lowers his eyes and looks at Goody through his eyelashes, just to feel the thrill of it. And Goodnight swallows, his Adam's apple wobbling, looking for all the world like a dumbstruck yokel. 

It makes Billy bold and before he even knows what he is doing he is across the fire putting his hand on Goody's chest. 

“Do you like it?” he asks, surprised at the low, breathy tone of his own voice, almost like a purr, and Goodnight stares at him helplessly, nodding as if he isn't quite aware that he is doing it. 

“Ah, well you certainly didn't dip your head in no crick,” Goody mutters, Louisiana hanging thick off his vowels and Billy feels a demented urge to laugh, and wondered if this was how cats felt when they succeeded in pinning down their prey with a deceptively soft-looking paw. 

“Handsome!” Xiaolian calls from the wagon, “Mr. Goodnight, he's handsome!” The shrill cry broke the moment and Goody nimbly ducks out from under Billy's hand, laughing. 

“He certainly is, Miss Xiaolian. Shining like a new dime.” 

He seems to find his feet after that, the affable veneer back in place as they go about setting up camp and Billy has congee and tea for his dinner, instead of salt pork and beans, and feels very pleased about it too. 

The women retire to the wagon to sleep and Goodnight spread out his bedroll and tipped his hat over his head. Silence falls over the camp and Billy still feels strangely happy. 

This is nothing like he had planned. He had imagined their meeting as tense and polite, settling their accounts and making excruciating small talk about their travels. He had hoped his own feelings would have died down and if they hadn't then maybe, _maybe_ , with enough alcohol inside of him, that tearing loneliness Goodnight wore like a coat would make him weak enough to fall into Billy's bed. It would be a drunken fumble that Goody would do his best to forget afterwards, and Billy would have fought a tearing battle with self-loathing to hold on to. This is not it at all.

The easy companionship, the way they fit around each other is still there, Goody's wide smile. And the way he had looked at him, his arms strong around Billy...

Goody stirs in his sleep and whimpers, hands opening and closing, and Billy sits down beside him, placing a hand on his shoulder. 

“Good night, Goodnight,” he murmurs and smiles when Goodnight's breaths evens out. 

*

The next morning Billy takes himself a little away from the camp to practice his knives. He likes to keep his skills, just like his knives, sharp. He looks up, mopping the sweat from his forehead, he notices he has an audience.

Xiaolian and Goodnight are sitting next to each other on a rock, watching him intently and with such avid interest that for one moment it makes him quite self-conscious. He turns his back on them deliberately and throws the last knife, the satisfying sound of it embedding deep in the tree.

Goodnight and Miss Xiaolian applauds, the girl getting up and darting away through the trees. 

Goodnight stays, looking at Billy the way he had sometimes seen Goody look at fine whiskey. With hunger and anticipation, but also with reverence, wishing to savour it, to enjoy it to an extent that made it justice. Just the thought of Goodnight enjoying him like fine whiskey, slowly and with satisfaction, makes Billy prickle hot all over. 

He wishes he had not lost control over his imagination. He wishes he hadn’t thought about any of those things. He wishes he'd had a month longer to think about them. He wishes he had imagined it more explicitly, with more detail, his tongue curling restless behind his teeth wishing to be against Goodnight's skin, his cock, his balls, his hole. He wishes it wouldn’t. He wishes it would.

“Now that's a show I've missed,” Goodnight says with satisfaction. “Better than the ballet in Paris,” and Billy snorts because how can he take Goodnight seriously when he's this ridiculous? He wishes he could give Goodnight his hand. It's hard to remember what about this was a bad idea. 

“Qiuyue come look, come look! Mr Rocks can throw knives!” Xiaolian was dragging Miss Wáng by the hand, chattering in excitement. “Look, he's very good,” she says. Billy is compelled to gather his knives again and throw them with the girl bouncing up and down and Goodnight and Miss Wáng applauding.

Billy collects his knives and tries to not look too much at Goody and then there is breakfast and breaking camp and in a few short days they will be in Carson city and Billy has to decide all over again what he is going to do. 

But, his body remembers Goodnight, the short moment when he pressed himself into Billy’s arms and the way he looked at him, with such interest. It feels different between them now somehow, like the fine quivering of a fishing line with a catch. He doesn’t know what has shifted but possibly this is a chance of making a different choice. He still feels the twined rope between him and Goodnight, wound thick with care and respect, humor and annoyance but maybe it doesn't need to be something that binds him, maybe it can be a tether for the both of them, a lifeline, connecting two rafts on the sea. Indecision eats at him, letting his horse trail after the wagon in the dust it stirs up and weights one thing against another over and over again. He misses the clarity of having made a decision but he doesn’t think he can bring himself to leave again. Ahead of him Goodnight turns in the saddle to look back at him, his narrow blue eyes catching Billy’s and Billy can feel his heart thump in his chest. He’ll give himself to Carson City before he does anything. Billy shifts discreetly in the saddle and decides to see if he can sneak away for a moment when they set camp tonight. On the trail his body has become accustomed to..certain accommodations, and with Goodnight in front his eyes have taken to roaming, taking every opportunity to remind him what so many of those were about. Billy stares ahead on the road in front of him, ignores his burning ears and tries to settle his mind on something boring. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout out to Lazaefair who very patiently helped me with the Chinese names. Thank you so much!


End file.
